Chris joined Feb 7, 2008

Currently working on a modified release of SMOD, hopefully as a base for adding in custom scenarios with .lua script. Basically the idea is to extend the average user's ability to customize the game to their liking.

To restore the Binoculars' identification functionality:
Line 150 of gamedata/configs/weapons/w_binoc.ltx - change vis_frame_speed from 0 to 4.

To reduce the minimum condition of a weapon that a trader will buy:
Goto all files in gamedata\configs\misc\trade and if they have a line with "buy_item_condition_factor", change it to the desired fraction (0.90 is 90%, etc). Please note that this will make it MUCH easier for you to make money, so I suggest only making a minor change.

Took the mission to help/kill the bandits who are robbing neutral stalkers. Since time jumped ahead a bunch without freezing my hunger and tiredness, I got a huge hit of hunger and tiredness when I was teleported to the mission area. Didn't have any food on me, and nobody in the area is carrying food. Problem is that since I'm at such high hunger the effect means I can walk about a meter before I have to stop and regen my stamina. If I try to walk back to Skadovsk, it'll take an hour. I know it's kind of a border case but I apparently went for about 12 hours without food and am now unable to walk more than a meter without needing to catch my breath?

I'm not so sure that this is the case. The URL posted ends in:
2012/01/13/MISERY_Stalker_CoP.zip
2012 being the year
01 being the month
13 being the day
meaning that the file would have been uploaded today. Why would someone upload an old beta to what I think is moddb's filehost on the "official" release day?

Using steam version:
Had an issue where the game would crash at the initial splash screen after running just fine the first time. Reinstalled and it appears to work fine again.

Looks like it's going to be a very difficult slog to get reasonable equipment though. Any suggestions for easy-ish missions/areas to clear first so I can afford some armor and possibly more than 1 magazine for each weapon? I chose recon, was surprised to see I wasn't even given a single extra magazine!

Which loadout did you select on install? I took the one with silenced weapons and haven't had stamina issues in my brief period playing. I think the FOV I selected (85 on 1920x1080) is too wide though, any way I can change that without reinstalling?

megabyte777 - The "crotch guns" problem is related to the custom models used being from Counter-Strike Source, and unfortunately the models' bones are not compatible with HL2 by default, and need to be converted to HL2 bones. Here is a link to a tutorial: Smod-tactical.com

resist777 - the download has a folder with full credits for all models used.

For all others - Yes, SMOD:Zenith is currently inactive. I hope to produce an updated version in the near future which addresses design and technical problems.

"packed full of foul mouthed language and other obscenities"
This has me worried. Keep in mind that while swearing _can_ be funny in a game, profanity for its own sake is just childish and stupid. Don't use the F word as a crutch to support poor writing. Everything else sounds good.

I'd like to second Sathanas' remarks. I'm up to chamber 19 and while the puzzles have been fairly clever and I appreciate the effort made in producing more challenging puzzles, what severs my enjoyment of the game is the use of unintuitive, precision portalling as a means to solve the puzzles.

What made Portal's puzzles enjoyable was that the time limits, if any, were fairly lax, so you had room to carefully plant your portals. Chamber 18, where I need to press a button, make an infinite loop and launch myself, then quickly jump from button to button to solve the rest of the problems was just plain painful. It's not that I couldn't figure it out, it's just that the sluggish view-rolling and confusion from portalling yourself into a daze makes it difficult for me to accurately and easily solve the puzzle. I finished it but not after swearing up a storm at the crazy requirements. There are other issues in other Chambers but I don't need to explain them all.

The problem is that these puzzles are designed for a lightning-fast, smooth and intuitive engine, while Portal is sluggish and clunky in this situation. It's like a ham-handed sumo wrestler trying to thread needles.

I'm really impressed at the effort put into this mod, and while the english voice "acting" is a bit odd, and has dodgy grammar, it's still pretty good. My issue is with the puzzles - They are easy to find the solution to, but hard to execute that solution. It should be the other way around.

Hey guys, I've been playing the Insurgency Mod for the past few days, since its release on the Steamworks thing. I'm having a good time playing, but I'd like to point out a few things I've noticed, in case nobody else has said them:

1) Teamkillers, oh boy. Today I was in a server where the US team could barely make it out of their spawn because there was a guy on their team rampantly teamkilling them every time he got the opportunity. He quickly racked up a morale score of -200 or so, before everyone got sick of him and left the server. I'm not sure if this is already possible but I'd like to see servers automatically kick or ban players with a certain morale score or lower. Considering that thus far the only way to lose morale is to teamkill, I think it's safe to say that anyone accruing a morale of -50 or lower is likely to be a griefer.

2) This is not so much a complaint, because I'm already quite impressed by the level of detail in the game, but I'd love to see some smoke bursts put onto the weapon firing animations. I'm pretty sure there's no muzzle flash on the guns because it's a sign of excess powder being burned after the bullet leaves the barrel and as such is unrealistic, but they will leave smoke, and I think it'd be a great aesthetic addition to the already fantastic model and skin detail in the game.

Check out the Valhalla and Eastern Sun mods:
Eastern sun is the one I'm currently playing, it retools a lot of the skills and items: Homepage3.nifty.com
I've currently got a level 77 Katana assassin on this mod, which is an interesting change from the dual claw-class weapons.

Valhalla is a pretty crazy mod, it raises the level cap to 300 and adds heaps and heaps of new items, along with changing many skills: Afterlife.ws

I'm going to see if I can get a big game going at the next LAN I visit. We've usually got a good amount of people playing UT2k4 so I hope I can get a big zombie-survival-fest going. Until then I might see if I can find some servers with decent ping.

I've yet to play with other people but Killing Floor is great. The maps are all very detailed have thick, spooky atmospheres and the combat is great. It's downright scary to play, with creepy monsters everywhere.

The only problem I've had with bots so far is that I can't make them follow me around! They just wander off and die easily. Sometimes they get stuck on welded doors, too. Otherwise they do a great job, and I'm impressed at the navigation of the monsters too. I've yet to find a camping spot where I can't be reached by the AI.

Citing HL2 as a good example of the silent protagonist is flawed, IMO - Valve's "lol piece the story together yourself" method of storytelling is very frustrating and Gordon's complete inability to respond to the questions asked of him and apparent disinterest in Earth's last 20 or so years without him breaks the illusion of realism.

Why can't I ask Eli to sit down and explain things to me? Why can't I even express pain vocally?

Some games should have a voice-acted player, others shouldn't.
Master Chief, Duke Nukem, JC Denton, Tommy (from prey), and others are all well-voiced player characters, and these do not necessarily detract from immersion. It always depends on the game in question, and the quality of the VA. I'm fairly confident that Gordon Freeman is silent because Valve don't want any fan-backlash against a voice actor they deem inappropriate for the role.

I downloaded an interesting sound pack for HL2 though, a while ago - A set of voice files for Gordon, with cries of pain, sarcastic backtalk at the HEV suit's voice, etc. Very funny. Search for Tenshihanquinn's stuff on Youtube.

I just had a go against bots. I have to say I'm quite impressed by the weapon designs, the new gore and explosion effects are great too.

However, it seems you've taken out what made UT what it is - the speed! There's no double-jump, no dodge-jump, you move at a crawl (even when sprinting) and left the player with a bunch of awesome weapons and effects, but the feeling that he's not playing UT anymore.

Didn't notice any strange bot behaviour from my test games in Deathmatch and Onslaught. I like the weapon-buying system, and the inventory too. The mod currently feels like it's more suited to gametypes like Assault and Onslaught.

Installation was very easy, thanks for the explanation video! Will keep an eye on this mod.

I don't expect that smell and taste-generating technology will _ever_ come about. If a system is produced which can replicate smell for the user it'll likely be sending impulses directly into the brain, and this will be 50 years down the track when we've got USB 3.0 ports in our necks. rather than creating something for the user to taste the system would simply "trick" the brain into thinking it's tasted or smelled something. Consider The Matrix's "plugging in", which is more likely to happen than a pad which you put under your nose.

This poll doesn't make sense - Smell and Taste are far from technologically developed, especially not to the point where a game could be doing stuff like that. Touch, yes, you've got stuff like force feedback in gamepads but again is not really well advanced, and any innovation done in that direction would be by hardware manufacturers first.

Which leaves me with two _feasible_ answers - sight and sound. Of course, visual effects boil down essentially to prettier graphics. I'd like to see more stuff happening like the Blink Monks Society business - using sound as an extremely useful gameplay mechanic.

More stuff with force feedback would be good too, but the problem is having a peripheral suited for multiple types of game _and_ able to do force feedback in a decent way.

I've got a few crash bugs - trying to load a saved game crashes the mod, and I think it locks up at the end of the lab map. Also, how are you supposed to finish the tetris level, it seems that the blocks are just too large to jump up to.

Great idea, haven't tried the multiplayer yet but the single-player maps are good fun.

As much as it sounds like you've got a great idea on your hands, I'm concerned that Nintendo might send you a Cease and Desist letter for using their Intellectual Property. Has your team OK'd this with them? It'd be a shame to have spent a whole lot of time and effort preparing a mod only to be shot down by the rightful owners of the IP.

UT3 was a massive disappointment for the PC crowd because it was geared toward consoles and their gamers.

It's obviously where the money is at the moment, in terms of game dev - consoles. Every slack-jawed yokel and his 11 siblings can plug in a Wii, 360 or PS3 and play a game. PC games are more complicated to get running, and the PC itself is often seen as an enigmatic magic box. This fact, coupled with the declining piracy rates on consoles (due to the online services) AND the ease of development (don't need to make games run on hodge-podge hardware) it's a very attractive platform for devs to work on - Bigger market to sell to, easier to develop for.

Unfortunately, this means that classic series such as Unreal Tournament, once loved because of their ample customization and great mod support, will be going the way of Halo - simplified, console-targeted gameplay.

Begone, Epic Games. Take your once-great series with you, and leave us in peace. Your dedication to the fans appears to have mutated over the years, and turned into something ugly. Unreal Engine 4 will likely just produce brown screens anyway, with the way you're going.

Broadsword - the health regen business can be disabled, if you want. I prefer to regen, simply because it means you don't have to get out of a battle at 4hp and spend a bunch of time looking for health. It'd be great if you only regenerated if there were no enemies within a certain distance. I might work on that at some point.

gomgom50 - Sorry, I haven't tested the HL2 campaign with mapadd enabled. I just did a run-through of a few levels though, and all enemies appear to be armed to me. You may have just missed that the enemies hold their guns wrong at the moment - if you go in close you might see that many of them have guns sticking out of their stomachs!

If they're really unarmed, I guess there might be something wrong with your installation. Try get a combine guy alive, standing in front of you by himself. If he shoots at you, he must be armed, lol.